OBESSU Position Paper on the promotion and validation of non-formal education and informal learning

Some of the most important learning young people do happens outside the formal classroom, and it is long past time that European education systems recognised this. Non-formal and informal learning, from student councils and peer mentoring to intercultural exchanges and community activism, builds the skills that formal education often cannot: critical thinking, democratic participation, adaptability, and solidarity. OBESSU calls on European institutions, Member States, universities, and employers to establish a Europe-wide system of validation for non-formal learning, and to treat it not as a supplement to real education, but as an indispensable part of it.